Page 115 of Falling Backwards
…or to convince her I still don’t want this cash.
So I look at her again, sigh, note that she hasn’t moved back from me, and remember how thoughtful she was to buy gummy worms for me.
I’m as freshly warm from that last thing as I am from how bold she was a minute ago.
I tip a smile to her.“I’ll tell you later.It’s nothing to do with him, though.He just…got me thinking.”
She nods.“Oh.Okay.Yeah, you gotta get back to the bar.”
“Yeah.”
Another holding look tries to grow between us.
We don’t let it.I take a step back from her and she gives me a smile, too, and then turns and heads for her locker.
I remember I need to go to my own.On the way over, I watch her slip her coat off, finally letting me see the dress she’s wearing.Even being simple, it looks great on her.
While I put my giftwrap and candy away, I think again about how nice our minutes together were.I skim over her thanks, her not being able to fight off a smile because of me, her excitement about my Fall Out Boy fib…and her hands in places that aren’t going to forget her for a long, long time.
If they ever even do.
I secure my locker and head out of the breakroom, hoping to catch her eye but only catching her sweetly complimenting the other hostess on her new glasses.
Lovely on the outside, lovely from the heart.
God knows I’ve gone a long time believing the latter wasn’t true about her anymore, but lately, in one way or another, she’s been making me rethink that.
M A G G I E
By the time Lucent is closing for the night, I feel weird.It’s a fine weirdness in some ways—a kind of dreamy peace that I don’t mind—and in other ways, it’s got me chilled and uneasy.
The rain picked up a few times as the day went on.I heard of flash flooding in some places around town, and I’m not sure if that has subsided yet, but it is still raining.In any case, several of our guests decided to cancel their reservations for this afternoon and evening, which left us with a surprising amount of slow time for a Saturday.
Some deep cleaning got done around here, so that was good, but eventually I had so little to do that I decided it’d be okay to relax a bit and watch the weather from the bar windows.Although part of me thought it would be unprofessional even with the windows in clear view of the hostess stand, an even bigger part had the steady feeling that it’d be okay.The restaurant was quiet and things were moving at a snail’s pace.By then, Luke was off work, so even he couldn’t have distracted me.
Not in person, anyway.
But one helpful thing that the thought of him did was remind me of how nothing bad happened at the sporting goods store when I broke the unspoken fitting room rule.Even though I hadn’t done what I thought I was supposed to, no harm was caused.No employee drama ensued.I went with the flow of the situation and things turned out fine.
If I’d been able to ask Luke about weather watching, I knew he’d support me doing it.And instead of that making me want to do it even less, I felt comforted.
It was nice.The outdoors were drab and blustery, but somehow I was soothed by looking out at them.
Even if itwasconducive to my mind freely running in a circle.
It went all over Luke and what happened in the breakroom, which I couldn’t even pretend to regret despite that I’m normally not that intrepid, playfully or otherwise.
And my mind went all over how I couldn’t help missing him being in the building not just because his absence made everything seem duller, but also because it made me feel unsettled.
Indeed, the latter is where my not-good weird feeling has come from.It has steadily built up over the last few hours with the weather being unpleasant, Lucent being far emptier than not, Ronald being as in-charge as an assistant manager can be from his office, and Luke not being around to smooth it all out.
I kept thinking about how Kyle knows I work here.About how he might come through the door at any minute and how the only person in view would be the petite female bartender and howmaybeI could get Ronald up here to help me before Kyle did anything creepy butmaybeI couldn’t.
It left me quaky.Anxious.
I couldn’t very well ask Luke to come back and calm me down, though.We texted during my break, which came shortly after he got off work, and he said he might watch some TV at home.I wanted him to do that.I wanted him to do whatever sounded fun and relaxing.Interrupting his free time and asking him to make a special trip here just so I’d feel better wouldn’t have been okay with me—Kyle wasn’t even here.
